Welcome to "Stay Strong" - a site devoted to sharing and inspiring "Strength" in others and in ourselves! Strength of Spirit, Strength of Mind, Strength of Soul and Strength of Body! PLEASE pass this site onto others in need of Strength and Inspiration!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Today we solemnly mark the seventh year anniversary of losing our sweet Fallie to her new home in Heaven.

On what is fittingly the longest day of the year, as we go about our daily business today please take a moment to stop and say a prayer for Fallie and her entire family who miss her more every passing day.

Keep her memory alive and her Spirit close to your heart because she is always here with us in our thoughts and souls.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

"Listen, son: I am saying this as you lie asleep, one little paw crumpled under your cheek and the blond curls stickily wet on your damp forehead.

I have stolen into your room alone just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me.

Guiltily I came to your bedside.

There are the things I was thinking, son:

I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault, too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. And as you started off to play and I made for my train, you turned and waved a hand and called, "Goodbye, Daddy!" and I frowned, and said in reply, "Hold your shoulders back!"

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon. As I came up the road I spied you, down on your knees, playing marbles. There were holes in your stockings. I humiliated you before your boyfriends by marching you ahead of me to the house. Stockings were expensive-and if you had to buy them you would be more careful!

Imagine that, son, from a father!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door.

"What is it you want?" I snapped. You said nothing, but ran across in one tempestuous plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me, and your small arms tightened with an affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not wither.

And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible sickening fear came over me.

What has habit been doing to me?

The habit of finding fault, of reprimanding-this was my reward to you for being a boy.

It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected too much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good and fine and true in your character. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. This was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me good night.

Nothing else matters tonight, son.

I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt there, ashamed!

It is feeble atonement; I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours.

But tomorrow, tomorrow, I will be a real daddy! I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer, and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come.

I will keep saying as if it were a ritual: "He is nothing but a boy-a little boy!"

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son, crumpled and weary in your cot, I see that you are still a baby.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Congratulations to the 2010-11 Stanley Cup Champion Boston Bruins and to my former teammate Tim Thomas!

Last night, we witnessed an unbelievable goaltender and and even better person. Even as he was in the midst of winning a Stanley Cup and accepting the MVP award last night, he was humble and reminded us of the most important things in life: family and hard work.

He traveled a long hard road filled with highs and lows and he earned all of that success last night. In a world filled with rockstar athletes,

Timmy demonstrated what a professional athlete and true role model is.

Not a day passes where I do not think of him and miss having him to talk with and just be around.

He taught me the value of being there for our loved ones, our children especially, in that I never once questioned or doubted the love and support he provided me growing up. He had my back always, and as I became an adult, he was truly my best friend. I miss him tremendously as I know that all who knew him do!

He was a great man of quiet strength and great love and compassion!

Happy Birthday Dad! I know you are golfing or hiking in the outdoors wherever you are today. Wherever that may be, enjoy it and know you are missed, loved and remembered always!!

Monday, June 6, 2011

Monday, June 5, 2011

"If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves."

- Thomas A. Edison

When Andrew Carnegie, the great steel magnate, commissioned Napoleon Hill to codify his philosophy of success into a form that could be taken to the world, he imparted to Hill that his first test of any man's potential for future success was to measure the man's willingness to go the extra mile – to render more and better service than that for which he is paid and to do it in a pleasingly positive mental attitude. His second test was to determine whether or not the subject has a definite major purpose in life and a plan to attain it. When you consider that most people are hoping to be afforded a shortcut to a vague notion of some kind of success they hope to achieve some day, is it any wonder that most people sorely underachieve in life? This is an indictment of mankind that I take no pleasure in leveling – primarily because it is an offence I too have been guilty of committing.

I don't think most people have any clue what they are capable of accomplishing in life. Some people suffer from a lack of willingness to go the extra mile; they are just not willing to do what it takes to accomplish a significant goal. More often than not, however, people suffer from either a lack of clarity or a lack of belief that they can actually achieve their goals – and the two are linked. If you are not crystal clear about what you want, you cannot possibly have any kind of detailed plan of how to attain it. It does not engender faith to shoot for a goal you don't clearly understand and have no idea how to attain. Clarity alone can be magical.

You are a miracle; between 75 and 100 trillion living cells all working together to produce an animated life form created in the image of The Almighty. You have more potential than you have any idea what to with as no human being uses more than even a sliver of his or her mental capacity. Understand that you have been endowed with the seeds of greatness and engineered for success. Get clear about what you want, create a detailed plan to get it, and get to work. Armed with a goal, a plan, and initiative, you will start to believe. When belief crystallizes to absolute faith you will astoundyourself with what you will accomplish.

"This time, like all times, is a very good one, if we but know what to do with it." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

No matter our situation or the station in our lives at any given time, we have to embrace it and never quit, never give in, never let the world dissuade us from our goals!!

Today, in order to make sure we do not take any part of our lives for granted, imagine life today WITHOUT a loved one in our lives! How silly does an argument seem in light of never being able to see them again???

Every one of us is blessed and we must look past our current short term trials and challenges to embrace our lives and every privileged minute we are given!!

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

"Whatever you can do, or dream you can, Begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it, Begin it now." -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

"Action is a great restorer and builder of confidence. Inaction is not only the result, but the cause, of fear. Perhaps the action you take will be successful; perhaps different action or adjustments will have to follow. But any action is better than no action at all. -Norman Vincent Peale

Get your STAY STRONG T-SHIRT!!

These ten great inspirational sayings about life come from diverse cultures and times. These sayings of inspiration represent the thread of enlightenment and compassion that has always run through the greatest among us, and are, to me, the best of the best.

This above all, to thine own self be true.- William Shakespeare

Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.- Confucius

Happiness depends upon ourselves.- Aristotle

A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.- Lao Tsu

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

All things share the same breath - the beast, the tree, the man... the air shares its spirit with all the life it supports.- Chief Seattle

Every child comes with the message that God is not yet discouraged of man.- Rabindranath Tagore

Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace.- St Francis of Assisi

There are no facts, only interpretations.- Friedrich Nietzsche

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.- Albert Einstein

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Life is no brief candle to me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.- George Bernard Shaw

We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned,so as to have the life that is waiting for us. The old skin has to be shed before the new one can come.- Joseph Campbell

The cave you fear to enter holds the treasure you seek.- Joseph Campbell

Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.- Helen Keller

Life is an exciting business, and most exciting when it is lived for others.- Helen Keller

Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood.- Helen Keller

Life may not be the party we hoped for, but while we are here we might as well dance. - Anonymous

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.- Confucius

Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.- Marie Curie

Life is a long lesson in humility.- James M. Barrie

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.- William James

Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans.- John Lennon

No one knows what he can do until he tries.- Publilius Syrus

As we light a path for others, we naturally light our own way.- Mary Anne Radmacher

There are no facts, only interpretations.- Friedrich Nietzsche

The purpose of our lives is to be happy.- Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama

I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw that life was service. I acted and behold, service was joy.- Rabindranath Tagore

To go against the dominant thinking of your friends, of most of the people you see every day, is perhaps the most difficult act of heroism you can perform.- Theodore H. White

Life is not about waiting for the storms to pass... It's about learning how to dance in the rain.- Vivian Green

I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you.I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for that part of me you bring out.- Roy Croft

I love you when you bow in your mosque, kneel in your temple, pray in your church. For you and I are sons of one religion, and it is the Spirit.- Kahlil Gibran

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.- Martin Luther King, Jr.

Where there is great love there are always miracles.- Willa Cather

Lord, grant that I might not so much seek to be loved as to love.- St. Francis of Assisi